This article contains spoilers For the end of season 2 “Andor”.

The gap between the seasons “and” seasons 1 and 2 has left a lot of space for fans to theorize what the second episode of the series “Star Wars” could bring. And although it is always clear that Bix Cafaen (Adria Arjona) would continue to play a major role in history, Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), many may not have guessed How much their romance arc would be centered for “Andor” season 2. Cassian’s relationship with Bix is, in many ways, the emotional nucleus of the season, and by extension, the spectacle, exploring how two people captured in impossible circumstances can make devastating decisions and unbreakable links.

The end of season 2 “Andor” sees Bix safely escape the violence of the war against the Empire, and also that she gave birth to a child with Cassian. It’s a great moment, but who may have surprised fans who had already read romantic implications in Cassian’s relationship with Jyn Erso (Felicity Jones) in “Rogue One”.

The showrunner Tony Gilroy, who led rewritings and major covers on “Rogue One”, recently recognized this fact in an interview with Collider. “I felt bad for the people who had invested so much time in the fan fiction and things like that,” said Gilroy. “It is not considered canon, and it is not something to pay attention, legally, in order, but people worked hard on this kind of thing, and that meant a lot for them,” he explained. “You don’t want to trample the flower garden of someone, you know? But I have to do what I have to do.”

It is natural in any story with a strong link between two main characters for at least certain fans to read the romantic intention. Cassian and Jyn have a particularly loaded end to their relationship (and, well, their life) via a pair of scenes after having made his plans of death safely of Scarif. First of all, there is the driving in a weakly lit elevator, with a shared appearance of deep connection. Then there is hand on the beach as they wait until the explosion wave of the death star destroys them.

“I knew very well what had happened with Jyn and Cassian in” Rogue One “and what had happened in the elevator,” Gilroy told Collider. “And I was really happy to see how we edited this, that it was really ambiguous about what it was.” Gilroy compared the link between Jyn and Cassian to any other strong platonic connection built in the wrestling period – something that has a great meaning, but which does not necessarily need to be connected to a romantic relationship. However, he feels at least a little bad for sender. “I’m sure there is someone who will never recover,” said Gilroy. “I apologize. I really do it.”

Even at the time when “Rogue One” came out, there were many who argued against a romantic reading of the last moments of Cassian and Jyn. The film avoids a lot of stereotypes by not kissing them, and their moment on the beach is all the more powerful because it is purely human, rather than being loaded with a kind of tragic love.

Bix could leave Cassian behind Without giving him a choice in “Andor”, but he seems to have no resentment. He understands why she had to go there and why she believed that he had to stay – a conviction that he comes to share by the moment when “Snape One” arrives. During the film, he sometimes seems disappointed with the mission of rebellion, until Jyn’s renewed fervor convinces him once again that their work is the most important thing.

On the beach, while waiting for death, Cassian does not cry the future he will not have. He seems completely in peace, using his few words to ensure a more anxious jyn than his father would have been proud of her – that her sacrifice, although incredibly tragic, was worth it. It is this version of Cassian that Bix sees. Knowing that knowledge of her pregnancy would take him away from the rebellion, she leaves, even if it would both deviate them.

However, Cassian finds new human connections with comrades like Vel (Faye Marsay) and Melshi (Duncan Pow), and later with Jyn. These links reflect the spirit of rebellion and Star Wars as a whole – a story about the unbreakable links of life and kinship which will always resist the unnatural oppression. As Gilroy said it to Collider, “why wouldn’t you hold someone’s hand at the end of the world?”